If I were to attempt to encapsulate the idea of GoHS within few words, as the brevity the digital age would have you require, I'd simply say: Battle Shounen on steroids. The more I ruminate on it, the more comfortable I feel at the phraseology of my likening. For indeed, the show exhibits nothing but a gross accentuation of the attributes idiosyncratic to the genre, while consistently outright ignoring the literary conventions for forming and maintaining an engaging narrative, much to the dismay of everyone who has the ridiculously unreasonable bar of expecting more in a story than mere mindless clash of swords/fists. The rule of cool permeates the very fabric of this adaptation; it is comparable to allocating one's skill points solely to one attribute. What should be a mere experience enhancer is mistaken for the main dish and is thence expected for one to stomach a plate filled with naught but condiments and spices. Needless to say it doesn't make for a particularly hearty (nor tasty for that matter) meal. Vague conceptions and aphorisms aside, I shall get on with the meat of the discussion.

As far as any work that features action compounding with fantastical elements go, what is paramount above all else is establishing what exactly those elements ARE, how it ties into the world and its mechanics, as well as the capabilities of the characters relevant to the story. And GoH has NOTHING, and by that I mean not even a SEMBLANCE of this very rudimentary understanding of how stories work in its arsenal. Gigantic swords are conjured from the sky, otherworldly creatures resembling Stands are summoned, anything ranging from elemental magic, cathode ray guns, regeneration, and even teleporting whole cities goes in this story with no apparent explanation to what even is the source of this arbitrary and inconsistent litany of distinct skillsets. Eventually, in episode 7, they chalk all of it up to a mystical power that transcends human knowledge borrowed from the Gods. This helps absolutely nothing; it's still impossible to gauge what our heroes/heroine are capable of, thereby obscuring the level of danger they face at any particular time. It's unimmersive as it is anticlimactic, why should you care about a battle that you cannot make anything out of? Anyone can survive anything, some random god can decide on a whim to bestow you powers. It successfully kills off any excitement one can have over analysing how the tides of battle can potentially change in either combatant's favour. Shows that aren't too keen on building the combat system from scratch tend to instead use internal monologues to give us a sense of the state of battle. This, while not being nearly as satisfying as deducing so yourself by extrapolating from visual cues, works absolutely fine. Too bad they decided not to do that either. As audience, you're but a detached onlooker, witnessing an alien occurrence play out, furrowing your eyebrows at the inexplicability of it all.

The cast is a reskin of the stock characters you've seen a couple hundred times by now. You got the hot-headed and bubbly mc who just loves fighting for the sake of fighting, the stoic and taciturn kick-ass going at great lengths for the people he values, and lastly the uptight and more ordinary tritagonist who mostly assumes the role of the Straight Man in the comical scenes that ensue. On the supporting cast too, the trends naturally follow, but with the added handicap of not being explored at all, unlike the mc's, whose motivations we at least were allowed some minimal disclosure of. There's the enigmatic rich businessman whom we have as much insight on in the end of episode 13 as we do in the beginning of episode 1, some deranged cult leader who just wants to see the world burn, an antagonist who wants to crush people and have as much power as possible because... uhh, you know what forget it, they're stock characters, perhaps better suited for theatre. Though it should be mentioned, my remarks here oughtn't be construed as claiming a uniquely realized cast is a prerequisite for a successful anime, that is not necessarily the case. If the narrative is gripping by itself, inoffensive and simplistic surrogates may very well suffice. But when it's already nothing to be proud of on those respects, this could only be seen as an aggravating factor in inducing head scratches.

There are two subplots seemingly interconnected with the motivations behind the tournament and the fate of the heroes of our story, but it is too unbaked to the point where even addressing it feels like giving it more than its due. "There is a cult-like organization discontent with the usage of charyeok?" Okay... "Mori's grandpa is constantly moving because baddies want him, also he has something to do with NK?" Sure... "Park Meijin and the commissioners have a plan involving the GoH to awaken the key?" What it is, what it is for, how GoH helps it manifest, why everyone and their mother is vying for it, these are all great questions; but well, how about more flashy animation instead? It's all a bunch of vagueries in an attempt to hold in place a series of action sequences, they could be more accurately described as passing remarks than plot points, given that they're mentioned once and never elaborated on again until they're literally at your doorstep. In the unlikely instance where you do get some expository direction, it'll be by means of brief info dumps that are unrelated to the scene in question. I legitimately had to look up the episode synopses in order to remind myself of these plot elements, not because the storytelling is too dense to take in, to the contrary, because there is so little info to go on when interpreting what the hell just transpired that it isn't a feasible nor a worthwhile endeavour.

In short, this is a well-animated fighting compilation that would work perfectly fine as a long-winded trailer for a fighting game. As a full-fledged narrative building up on itself it is an absolute joke.

Edit (1 Oct 2020): The final score of the review has been edited from 3.2 to 2.5 to better reflect the content of the critique. Additionally, some typos are amended.